En español, en français, em português.
Introducing one of the exciting new features of the Mirai booking engine this year: an indicative pricing layer over the calendar which allows users to select dates. This feature is at no extra cost and comes with Mirai’s own touches.
You can see it in this hotel
This layer is intended for users with flexible dates, who will be able to find the cheapest days at a glance, redirecting the demand to those days that are more difficult to fill.
Price calendars are commonplace in the travel and accommodation industry but, at Mirai, we have incorporated some unique features in addition to all the usual functionalities.
Better than Google and Booking.com
For the Mirai pricing calendar, we’ve taken the best features offered by the big names, such as Google and Booking.com – making it light, fast, unobtrusive, efficient and in the right place – and we’ve added our own customisation and additional information to give it Mirai’s distinctive touch.
Seamlessly integrated and visible at first glance
Our pricing calendar appears in the best possible place, which is on the date selector in the booking engine. It is immediately visible when selecting dates or trying to change dates during the booking process.
This placement ensures that, unlike others, 100% of users viewing dates will see the calendar. It’s not hidden, you don’t have to go out of your way to find it, it doesn’t add any more buttons or fancy elements, it will simply appear at the right moment.
Always in the right currency
It seems obvious but few calendars meet these requirements:
- The user’s currency is shown by default, based on their country and the currency you have configured to display for that country
- It is possible to change the currency, once in the engine
- All currencies are available, not just the major currencies
Personalised figures for every customer
Different languages and countries present figures, currency names and their positions in different ways.
- Depending on the user’s language-country combination (“locale”), it displays the format they are used to
- We avoid confusion in case of $, by specifying the corresponding currency in the legend using the ISO format (3 letters), e.g. MXN, ARS, USD…
- Decimals are omitted to reduce unnecessary information in a table that is already dense with figures; approximate prices “from” are shown
- Thousands are abbreviated, which is especially useful for currencies with many figures
The exact price… and well explained
First of all, these are minimum public prices, per room and for two people.
For the public, this includes your loyalty club prices, if you offer them from the first booking, as well as your restricted mobile, night or weekend prices.
Although users are increasingly used to interpreting these prices as indicative, there are always those who are more suspicious. We have added a caption stating that these are approximate prices, the number of nights for which the price is obtained, whether taxes are included, that it is per room (or apartment, etc.) and for two adults, as well as the currency in ISO format.
Dates without availability: best not to indicate them here
The Mirai price calendar deliberately does not indicate unavailable dates, especially not in garish red colours. This is to prevent the user from giving up and closing the page too quickly. All dates can be selected, even if they are not priced. It is better to let the user continue, consult the dates and, if unavailable, take them to an informative page that explains the reason and, above all, offers alternatives on other dates or with other partner hotels.
The other key reason for not displaying unavailability is that it allows you to measure requests for all dates. If you don’t let user consult any date, how will you measure your unmet demand? Users simply won’t look and their search will not be recorded.
Perfectly adapted for mobile phones
Another basic feature that is not always met is that prices in the calendar should be displayed with the same content and ease of use on mobile devices; they should be tactile and without cumbersome arrows.
You choose the number of nights that correspond to the price
The minimum price for each day may vary according to the length of stay chosen by the user, which we are not aware of when displaying the calendar.
A decision has to be made, and it may be that some establishments benefit from one-night prices and others from more nights. This essential differentiation is possible with Mirai. You choose the number of nights that correspond to each price, depending on your characteristics.
Choose one night if…
- Your average stay is low. This will make it more representative
- Your price for one night is not much more than for longer stays. Otherwise your calendar would show more expensive prices than most people pay, losing its initial attractiveness
- You have lots of days without availability
Choose more nights if…
- You have more competitive prices for longer stays or your average stay is high
What happens if you usually have a minimum stay restriction
It is not a problem: the calendar takes into account minimum stay dates and calculates the price based on the number of nights that meet this restriction. This way, if you have configured the calendar to calculate the price for a single night, we avoid it showing a day without a price, as it often happens in other calendars:
You choose whether to include taxes or not
As with all your prices in the booking engine, the ones shown on the calendar will include taxes or not depending on your chosen configuration.
100% integrated into your hotel’s website
Colours, fonts and sizes are customised to match your corporate image.
Unlike other calendars with bright colours that remain the same for all hotels and chains, our price calendar is fully integrated into your website.
What you need to do to get it
We will roll it out progressively over the coming weeks. You do not have to do anything. If you would like your prices to be displayed for stays of more than one night, please let us know, as you cannot configure it yourself.
What if you don’t want it? It’s your choice
We can’t think of a reason why your website shouldn’t be on par with other hotels, OTAs or Google, as far as the price calendar is concerned. Its advantages far outweigh its potential disadvantages. But if you are still not convinced, please contact us.
If you have any questions at all, please contact your account manager.
